Nut Thins

A vintage drop cookie that does an enormous amount with very little. A handful of pantry ingredients (butter, sugar, eggs, flour, salt, nuts, vanilla) come together into a simple batter that spreads thin in the oven and bakes into crisp, buttery wafers full of toasted nut character.

The low 300°F (150°C) bake is the move. Hotter ovens brown butter cookies quickly on the outside while leaving them chewy inside. At 300, the cookies dry out evenly as they bake, which gives nut thins their signature snap-crisp texture all the way through. Drop the dough well apart on the sheet because these spread aggressively.

Use whatever nut suits the craving (pecan, walnut, almond) and whatever extract beyond vanilla you might be feeling (almond, rum, maple). Easy to mix, easy to bake, hard to stop eating.

Pro Tips

• Toast the nuts first on a dry sheet pan for 5 minutes; raw nuts taste flat against the buttery dough
• Drop the dough by teaspoonfuls about 3 inches apart; close cookies merge into one sheet
• Watch the bake carefully; pull when edges are golden but centers still look pale; they crisp on cooling
• Cool 1 minute on the pan before moving; immediate transfer breaks them
• Store airtight at room temperature for up to a week; nut cookies stale fast in humid weather

Variations

• Add a half teaspoon of cinnamon or cardamom for a spiced version
• Drizzle melted dark chocolate over cooled cookies for chocolate-dipped nut thins
• Use brown sugar in place of half the white sugar for a deeper, butterscotch-leaning flavor